<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Dreams and Nightmares and Mutterings of a Madman by ThatGuyAlex</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27700589">Dreams and Nightmares and Mutterings of a Madman</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatGuyAlex/pseuds/ThatGuyAlex'>ThatGuyAlex</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Original Work</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Cross-Posted on Wattpad, Dreams, Dreams and Nightmares, Gen, Horror, Nightmares, One Shot, Original Character(s), Original Fiction, Originally Posted Elsewhere, Short, Short One Shot</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-07 03:53:33</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>599</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27700589</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatGuyAlex/pseuds/ThatGuyAlex</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>He came to me in a dream, neither of us knowing how it would soon turn into a nightmare.<br/>Completed: 3/23/2020</p>
            </div></td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Dreams and Nightmares and Mutterings of a Madman</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This was originally posted on March 23rd, 2020. I've just reuploaded all my works to AO3 now that I have an account.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It started small. A voice in my head, one that wasn't my own, asking and questioning and trying to understand just what exactly was happening. Then, I'd see him as I closed my eyes. Even to just blink, he'd appear, if only for a split second, but it only got worse as I closed my eyes in order to drift off into sleep.</p><p>He was there, messy hair and wild eyes, looking around in confusion, in question. I didn't have any answers for him, I didn't know why he was there, if he was even real, if I had finally hit my breaking point and was drifting towards insanity. We would talk, endless talking in order to fill the silent void we lived in, because while the noise was booming the silence that would fill once we stopped was deafening, maddening.</p><p>But there was always something lurking, hiding in the corner of my eye, just barely out of reach. Flickers of shadows and wisps of something not quite human, not quite normal. I didn't realize it, but every time I opened my eyes and left that plane of existence, of distorted reality veiled in an illusion of serenity, the shadows would grab him and drag him away, only bringing him back just before I closed my eyes once more.</p><p>It was a repeated cycle, one that I only started to notice as the marks on his body grew. Small bruises turned large, lines like branches appearing on his skin as he insisted he was okay, that I didn't need to worry. I didn't believe him, but pretended I did, because I could see how my questions were affecting him.</p><p>One day, he snapped. I didn't know what happened while my eyes were open. I tried sleeping more, taking naps or resting with closed eyes in order to see him, to stop the torment that dragged through him like a dull knife cutting through jagged and rough skin, leaving blisters and bruises in its path. There was a look in his eyes, a certain glint I couldn't quite explain, until he grabbed me, a wicked grin stretching across his face as the madness took over. He muttered words only the insane would say, saying he had to have me, he had to take me away, because if he didn't there would be a price. That they were watching, always watching, lurking around when my eyes were open, ready to slash and grab and steal his very essence away from him.</p><p>My eyes snapped open, and when they closed once more, he was gone. They took him, it seemed. I don't know where, or for what reason, but I feel like they're after me too. I once took his mutterings for one of a mad man, but I soon realized those words spoke the truth, and now they were coming for me. I saw them everywhere. When I shut my eyes they haunted me, everywhere I looked they loomed in the shadows and in the corners of my vision. I couldn't escape them. They were everywhere. I realized the boy's fate when they came to drag me away too, to become one of them and haunt others, and realized that the boy had been trying to protect me, to be a barrier between them and I, only to be driven to madness and try to steal me away just like they did. He had failed and become one of them, and now my fate had been decided by the gods as I was snatched away into the darkness, just like he.</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>